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Now here's some typical blower access we have to deal with!
No cat walk either. You got to SQUEEZE between the panel and insulation while stradling the TRUSS's and trying NOT to crush the flex duct everywhere like a damn spagetti dinner gone wrong!

Also WATCH OUT for that brittle as hell ORANGE SPRINKLER LINE!!!! It ran right in the area you have to CRAWL through to get to the blower section at the other end!

Another tech from the company took this picture and gave it to me. He was mad he had to deal with this crap! There's No reason for any of it. but our inspectors in Phoenix MUST get paid off by the builders or something, because THIS is normal! Some are WORSE!!!
Duct strap??? We don't need any stinkin' DUCT STRAP!
Let the truss's hold it up! Floppy flop flop!

I can't defend this.

If this unit had an Inspector within 20 miles, It should have been caught. I'm not saying that it wasn't inspected either. The City I work for prefers to get Inspectors from the trade. Some find it cheaper to hire a guy who watched his neighbor install a furnace once, and cross-train him to inspect other trades that he is even less qualified for. This is the kind of work that gets by when you have unqualified inspectors, and sometimes I'm sorry I'm a party to it all.

This is done daily in the cookie cutter homes in the Phoenix area. Not way out in the boonies where no one sees it.

There should be no excuse for this sh!t. But I think the inspectors MUST get paid off. What else could it be?
There's many housing tracks WORSE than what I just showed with ALL of the units installed with crappy access, etc. Oh, they get MUCH worse than this! I just don't have pictures of them. Yet.

HEY---
please do not cut into the inspectors to deep..they are not the ones doing the work..and yes there is a clearance required in front of a gas appliance of 30 inches working space or whatever the directions call for. whichever is the most restrictive---or greater will apply. Have a nice day.......

Oh you make it sound so wonderful. Actually when you break on of these lines, it doesn't give you a nice mist to cool off with. It pumps several gallons of water out into the attic while you go run frantically to find the water source. By then it's all flooded.

It hasn't happened to me yet. But I've ran over to help another tech or two right after.

Funny thing. Last Friday night I got to this call at 6PM. Went to lift the scuttle lid and had to move it sideways to clear the sprinkler line they ran over the opening!!!!
I could see the line then ran all the way down where I had to walk to the air handlers. I said F$#k this and told the H.O. about it and turned OFF her water supply before I would go up there and take ANY chances spending a late Friday night cleaning up a water mess!

They now make them install these on homes over 2000 sq feet. But can't they use better material and MAKE them do it right??? What's with them strapping it to the cat walks that FLEX while we walk on them??????? If you GET a cat walk!!! This house on Friday night had a section of cat walk made of 3/8 PLYWOOD! It flexed so much under me it almost touched the sheet rock under it!!! Talk about a surprise!
IDIOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!

HA ha ha. Most of the sh*t we get to work on is from the ever growing TRACK (cookie cutter) homes that seem to not have to pass inspection for some reason.
I haven't figured it out.

There ARE nice installs too. Not too many compared to the thousands and thousands of NEW homes. It's the crappy ones that pi$$ me off when I have to work on them! So I come here to post them and to vent.

It's not so much me having problems fixing the crap. Most of it is easy for me. It's just annoying to just witness the hackery. Especially because the new construction part is the same company that runs the COD division I work for.
I can't just go in a house and say the install or the equipment is CRAP. Even though it is! Especially when 75% of the builders got to use cheap Goodman heat pumps. Top that off when you KNOW some installers blow and go when they got 10 houses to start a day for one guy at times! No vacuum on the splits, they just open the king valves and vent some of the air. Nice. No wonder so many Goodman comps are loud as hell and die so many agonizing deaths!

Damn. I'm getting cursed with these houses with the damn sprinkler lines fastened to the cat walks! Here's another one from today!

These damn lines get brittle. Not too mention the cat walk moves so damn much when you step on them. It's scary to watch the area where the sprinkler line is flex as you walk on the cat walk!
The sprinkler line here is ran and fastened right where you need to sit in front of the air handler.

Inspectors you say? They don't care. Must be in bed with the bigger builders.

Also note the flex duct is installed with it just LAYING where it wants to. NO STRAPPING! This is normal to see here. I NEVER new anyone to NOT stretch duct and strap it until I came down to Phoenix, AZ.
Again. Since the company I work for installs this crap, I can't offer to fix it. Because the H/O would look back at me and ask why WE (the company) didn't do it RIGHT in the first place!
This is actually one of their BETTER installs!